


The Truth will Out

by DK65



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, Missing Persons, Mystery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-24
Updated: 2016-06-24
Packaged: 2018-07-18 00:40:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 16,372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7292581
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DK65/pseuds/DK65
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When journalist and writer Tyrion Lannister is asked to ghostwrite stockbroker Petyr Baelish's campaign biography, his former student and current girlfriend Alayne asks him to take on the job, to discover what became of her mother...</p>
<p>These characters belong to GRRM.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Thursday

Tyrion had spent most of his working life meeting deadlines and astounding his editors with his resourcefulness in digging for information and eloquence as a writer. He’d won several awards for his work as a journalist, which had led, not upwards and onwards to the management suite, but into academia and to a career where he became his own boss, as a writer of narrative non-fiction. He’d managed to surprise his father, who had considered him incapable of achieving anything.

So when he was asked by his father’s protégé, stockbroker Petyr Baelish, to assist with the writing of his campaign biography, he was somewhat surprised. He asked his father, half-joking, “I hope you didn’t recommend me to Petyr Baelish!” only to meet a surprised look in the old man’s eyes. 

“As a matter of fact, I didn’t,” Tywin responded coldly. “He noticed your latest book was number one on the New York Times bestsellers list.”  
Tyrion merely nodded; he was anxious to get home. He hoped Alayne would be there—she’d told him she would come.

She was a former student of his; she’d done a dual degree, in journalism and business. She was hard-working and dedicated. She said the dual degree had been a compromise with her father, who’d wanted her to go to Harvard for an MBA and then work alongside him at Arryn Securities. But she was determined to be a journalist, so she persuaded him to let her study in New York, because it would be closer to home. He’d agreed reluctantly. She’d got a job reporting on economic issues with a respected local paper—the TriState Times. This had annoyed her father somewhat, but she had been firm. “I told him,” she said when they became lovers, “that I wanted to make my own way, just like he had done. He didn’t go into farming or soldiering or diplomacy like his grandfather and father; he became a stockbroker. I think,” she said with a laugh, “that it was that which convinced him to let me lead my life.”

She hadn’t yet told her father about Tyrion or their relationship. That was all right with Tyrion; he had not spoken of her to his family either. They were still at that stage where they did not want to share each other with the rest of the world.

Alayne was a woman of her word; when he unlatched the door to his apartment, he found her there, lying on his couch on her stomach with her legs raised in the air, as naked as her nameday, her red-gold hair cascading down her back, reading a book. He growled deep in his throat when he saw her; he could feel the heat of desire spread all through him, just by looking at her. She got up, looking at him with an intensity that had him almost ripping off his clothes, and led him to the bedroom. They said little as they flung themselves upon each other, as if they had not met for an age; they’d just parted at dawn after a passionate and sleepless night, and this was only six in the evening.

An hour or three later, as they lay gasping and laughing together in his bed, he told her about her father’s offer. “You didn’t recommend me, did you?” he asked, with a grin.

“No, you don’t need my recommendation; I’ve just started out as a journalist, Professor,” she said in a tone of voice that was so suggestive that he almost began making love to her yet again. But he stopped when he saw the expression on her face.

“Tyrion, I do want you to take up the assignment. I know you’ll do Dad justice; I think you might also be able to find out something about my mother. And maybe, just maybe, you might be able to discover what hold the Arryn woman has over him.”

It was only when they became lovers that Alayne told Tyrion the truth about her origins. She’d been abandoned as a baby a few days old on the steps of an orphanage. She’d lived there till she was six, when Petyr Baelish had arrived with a letter from her mother, which stated that he was her father. He’d taken her away to be raised on a farm in upstate New York, which he visited occasionally; she’d gone to school at the poshest private schools, where she’d studied alongside the daughters of her father’s colleagues at Arryn Securities. However, unlike these girls who were content to marry the sons of their father’s friends, she was determined to make a life for herself, on her own terms. Her father was prepared to smooth her path to a hectic but well-paid job at a firm where he had risen by dint of hard work and talent, while she was determined to work hard in her own field and thus prove herself his heir. 

Tyrion had understood this stubborn desire in her to prove herself, her self-worth. He’d hoped, first as the youngest and brightest child of three and then as a brilliant graduate, that his father would recognize his ability by giving him a suitable job in the firm of Lannister & Sons. But that was not to be; his father still hoped that Jaime, who’d enlisted as a volunteer during the Vietnam war instead of applying to college, would give up his job in the NYPD and join the family firm. He was totally unprepared to let Tyrion take up a responsibility and rewards that should have been Jaime’s. So Tyrion had taken the money left by his mother in a trust fund and gone on to do a degree in journalism. He’d used his father’s rejection of him as a spur.  
He soon learnt, from what Alayne let fall, that she’d avoided being in a serious relationship throughout college. She’d been focused on doing well, graduating with a high GPA and getting the career of her choice. “Boyfriends,” she told him once, as she played with the hair on his chest, “were a distraction I didn’t need. I wanted to make my father proud of me. And the only way to do it was to do well academically.” Also, she’d noticed and been troubled by the lack of female companionship in her father’s life. “I could see he was lonely,” she said, as she lay beside him in his bed, “and I felt I was needed; I had to be there for him.”

But four years (or more) is a long time; by the time Alayne came home after college, she realised that her father was involved with the widow of his late boss, Jon Arryn. “I was happy for him; finally, he had some companionship in his life,” she said. But then, her father began making plans—of getting her a job in Arryn’s, having her move to the penthouse floor in the Eyrie, where Mrs Arryn lived with her son, young Robin, and encouraging a relationship with young Harrold Hardying, Robin’s cousin and heir presumptive. And this, being subsumed into her father’s new relationship without a by-your-leave, was what really led to Alayne’s decision to have her own career and lead her own life. She was firm about working for the TriState Times, and just as stubborn about sharing an apartment with Myranda Royce and the Stone sisters, Bella and Mya. And she had finally decided that she needed a man (“not a boy like Harry—he got two girls pregnant before he left school!”) in her life, a man of her choosing. She was on the prowl for the right man when she ran into Tyrion again, at a late night show she was reviewing for her paper; he’d gone to see it as a favour to Shae, an ex-girlfriend. He was quite happy, indeed ecstatic, to fall into her arms.

“Please understand, Tyrion; I’m not jealous of her or anything. But she has some kind of a hold over him, which I cannot understand. I’ve seen her; she’s overweight and looks as though she likes her booze. Dad says he was in school with her and her sister; that’s all very well, but you don’t go marrying someone you knew back in school. If I were to follow that principle, I might just go off and marry Loras Tyrell, whom I used to root for when I was a schoolgirl. And that wouldn’t do at all; he hasn’t your tastes or talents.” She said with a smile at the end. “Dad’s rather fastidious, you know; he encouraged me to be turned out just right—not too flashy or dowdy—so I don’t know what he sees in her.”

“She has the obvious hold over him—she’s the widow of a rich and influential man…”

“Who left most of his money in trust for his son and his …. I don’t know… grandnephew? Because that is what Harry is to him.”

“So that’s why he wanted you to marry Harry—he wanted you to get a cut of the Arryn wealth. Really, Alayne! You should have listened to him--I thought you had more sense.”

“Harry,” she said patiently, “loves football and pretty women, in that order. He’s a jock and he’s selfish. I don’t need him in my life. Besides, Professor, I haven’t done too badly. Isn’t that what your dad would say?”

“He wouldn’t,” Tyrion said with a laugh, kissing her. “He’s left most of his money to my sister’s kids. The family firm is being run by my uncles and cousins; he’s left a trust fund for Jaime, in case he gives up on the NYPD and wants to work for Lannister’s. He’s left a tiny, a very tiny, contingency fund for my use, in case I fall ill or am disabled. So if you want to run, Ms Baelish, now’s your chance to flee. I live by the sweat of my brow.”

“Flee? Why should I flee? I refuse to do so. The only condition on which I will flee is if you pursue me and make mad, passionate love to me when you catch me,” she said, springing out of bed.

“Done,” he yelled, making a grab for her, as she ran from him all over the apartment. He finally caught up with her in the sitting room; they ended the night on the couch, making love.


	2. Friday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tyrion meets Petyr Baelish, Lysa Arryn, Robin and Harry and learns a great deal...

The next day, Tyrion made an appointment with Petyr Baelish; they met in the afternoon, in his office on the lower floors of the Eyrie, which served as offices for Arryn Securities. They discussed the project at length; Tyrion had, in the course of his career, kept files on many notable personalities in business, politics, academia, the arts and the military. So he came prepared with a basic plan for the biography and described how he would develop it.

“That’s very impressive, Mr Lannister,” Petyr Baelish said, with a smile. “Are you by any chance related to the Lannisters of Lannisters & Sons?”

“As a matter of fact, I am; my father is the managing director,” Tyrion said calmly, not certain where the conversation was going.

“Oh? You did not go into the family business then? Wasn’t your father disappointed?”

“I think my father had become used to disappointment when I chose journalism and not business as a career. My elder brother Jaime joined the NYPD after Vietnam,” Tyrion explained, with a smile.

“I really feel for him,” Baelish said, sadly. “I hoped my daughter would go into business like I did. She refused to consider it. And I had even selected a suitable young man for her. She refused to consider that as well.”

“Perhaps she’s following in your footsteps, sir? I don’t recall a Baelish in business before you came on the scene,” Tyrion said.

“No, not in the states; but in the old country…” Petyr began, but soon stopped, when Lysa Tully Arryn swept into the room. She was dressed, Tyrion noted rather judgementally, in an outfit that would have suited a woman twenty years younger and a few stone lighter. She was heavily made up and the perfume she wore would have made the inhabitants of a Parisian bordello sneeze. She was followed by a sulky teenager and a young man, both dressed as befitted their class.

He was introduced to Lysa, who greeted him perfunctorily; she flung herself upon Petyr, who was, in terms of weight and height, much below her standard. While she proceeded to shower him with affection, Tyrion introduced himself to the two young people who had accompanied her; he was soon talking to Robin Arryn and Harrold Hardying. When he noticed that Lysa had, for the moment, ceased belabouring Petyr with her affections, he took his leave, after informing Petyr that he would make an appointment with his secretary for a further meeting. 

Harrold and Robin accompanied him out of Baelish’s office; he made an appointment with Lyn Corbray for a lengthier meeting the next week to work on the book. As he prepared to leave, he found the boys following him.

“My mother,” Robin explained with an expression of irritation, “will spend all morning there. She’s totally besotted. And she’s totally taken up with the wedding. She’s actually had a fight with my aunt in Boston, because Aunt Catelyn remarked on how quickly she was remarrying after Dad’s death.”

Tyrion decided to spend some time talking to the boys. He took them across to the Pegasus Café, run by the Stone sisters, where they ordered coffees. He was soon pumping the boys skilfully for information; Robin, he learned, was really angry with his mother because she had quarrelled with his aunt. He was close to his Stark cousins and had hoped to spend the summer in Boston. As for Harrold (“call me Harry,” he said with a laugh. “Everyone does!”) he’d hoped to turn professional and play football for the Winterfell Wolves. All these plans had fallen by the wayside. They were both rather disapproving of the fact that Baelish had moved in with Mrs Arryn before the wedding. And they both grudgingly acknowledged that Alayne, Baelish’s daughter, had kept her distance.

“She’ll come for the wedding, of course,” Robin said. “She said she would be her dad’s best woman—carry the ring and so forth. But she refused to stay with us; she told mum and her father she wasn’t a little girl but an adult and would room with Myranda and the girls,” he waved his hands at the dark-haired, blue-eyed girls, who resembled (to Tyrion’s eyes) feminine and more graceful versions of Robert and Renly Baratheon. Robert was married to his sister, Cersei; Renly, Robert’s younger brother, had been Tyrion’s companion in mischief when the two of them, along with Edmure Tully and Benjen and Lyanna Stark, had raised hell in Washington back in the sixties.

“She’s not a bad looking kid,” Harry said with a grin. “Pity she’s so serious, though.”

“Couldn’t help it,” Robin snapped. “Spent her childhood in an orphanage. Went to Waynewood’s with the girls, who can be bloody snobbish—both Mya and Bella used to be very stoic about going back, even though your aunt was bloody good to them. Got a very high GPA on graduation. And she works bloody hard and is bloody nice.” He glared at his cousin as he spoke. Tyrion rather liked him.

Harry smiled smoothly, finished his coffee, offered to pay but was forestalled by Tyrion taking the bill. He left at once. “Bloody typical,” Robin muttered. “I have some cash; I’ll split the bill with you, if I may.” He said firmly. Tyrion thanked him—he thought the kid had spunk.

They continued to sit and talk in the café; Robin said he had no desire to go back home—his mother would want to know every detail of what he’d said and done. Tyrion did not have to ask too many questions to get him to talk. Yes, his mother and Mr Baelish had been friends when they were both in school. They’d drifted apart afterwards; his mother and dad had married, Mr Baelish had gone to college and when he graduated, his mother had arranged an interview for him with someone at her husband’s firm. When Tyrion raised a questioning eyebrow, Robin glared back at him. “She told me so herself,” the boy snapped. “Of course, he did frightfully well; he got three times more people to buy the securities he sold, compared to the other guys who’d just joined. He just kept on climbing. He was on the board of directors when Dad died—my father was much older than Mum, if you must know.”

“So when did Mr Baelish find the time to get involved with your step-sister’s mother?” Tyrion enquired.

“She’s not my step-sister, at least not yet.” Robin said, with a sigh. “It would be great to have an older sister, don’t you think?” he said to Tyrion, who would have disagreed violently. Having Cersei as an older sister had been sheer torture; but Alayne, he was certain, would be a different kettle of fish.   
He nodded in assent, and the boy continued to talk. It seems that Petyr Baelish had become involved with the daughter of a rather senior member of the Irish-American aristocracy. He would have proposed marriage, but she was already engaged to someone in Ireland. He didn’t know about her pregnancy; she was sent off to spend time in a convent and deliver the baby, who was left on the steps of an orphanage somewhere in upstate New York.

“Funnily enough, Mum was a trustee there, so when Petyr got this letter from his one-time girlfriend, he went to her and she used her influence. At least, that’s what she told Dad. It appears this lady love of his was told her baby had died; it was only when her father was dying that he confessed to her what he had done. Mum told Dad the whole story—it quite upset him; I could tell, even though it happened when I was young.”

“How old were you when you heard this story?” Tyrion asked casually.

“Five or six—I was under the table in my father’s study, racing toy cars, if you please, while Mum told him this story. It made quite an impression on me.”

“Have you seen the letter in question?” Tyrion asked, almost lazily. 

“I know he gave a notarized copy of it to the orphanage—that’s what Mum said. She thought they should have just let him have little Alayne. Dad disagreed—he said they needed proof that he was the girl’s father before they gave her to him. The woman had enclosed a birth certificate and all. Everything was in order. He probably has the originals on file somewhere; he might even have them in a safe deposit box.”

“I don’t suppose your mother mentioned a name? She did? Rose O’Brien? Thanks, Robin—it’s been great talking to you.”

Tyrion went home, thinking of what he would tell Alayne. She was there as usual, cooking up something that smelt delicious. When he asked her why she was taking the trouble, she said, rather mischievously, “I think you need to keep up your strength, Tyrion!” He laughed, and described the meeting he’d had with her father and stepmother-designate as they ate dinner. He went on to talk of Robin, and told her what he’d said about her mother.

She put her coffee cup down rather sharply on the saucer. “Oh drat, I hope I haven’t cracked it!” she said, sounding remorseful. “Do you know, Tyrion, Robin and his mother know more about my mother than I do? I did not dare ask my father the questions you asked Robin, because I was so afraid of hurting his feelings. Rose O’Brien? But that’s a rather common name, isn’t it—like Jane Smith? I know I can write to the orphanage and ask to see the papers; Miss Mordane, who is now in charge, was the one who used to look after me when I was there.”

“You could also take up another line of enquiry—get a paternity test done,” he suggested thoughtfully. “Perhaps if you provided some hair or nails or blood, and took the same from your dad, you’d be able to, I dunno, isolate the genes for your mother? I don’t think we have a genetic database, but you can look for a Rose O’Brien with a certain blood type or other medical characteristics. And if she had you here, it means there would be medical records, even in a Catholic hospital.”

She listened to him thoughtfully and nodded. “I’m going to the Eyrie tomorrow for the weekend; I wasn’t looking forward to it at all, because Father wants me to move in with him and Mrs Arryn and Robin and Harry and I find the mere thought of it nauseating. Robin’s not so bad, but Harry? And Lysa will say what Dad wants her to say, although I can tell she hates my guts. Because of my mother? Dad always gets me to do his nails; he refuses to go to a salon for anything other than a haircut and a beard trim. I think I can do it, Tyrion!” And she hugged him, excitedly.

“I might spend a night out with the boys,” he told her, sounding glum. He usually enjoyed the evenings he spent with Renly, Edmure and Benjen, but with Alayne’s advent into his life, his evenings had become extremely exciting. So an evening out with the boys, filled with booze and talk and pizzas and football, did not sound exciting enough.

“Have fun,” she said firmly. “It’s always good to keep up with friends. Perhaps Edmure can tell you more about my father; they were boys together.” Tyrion immediately cheered up when she said this.


	3. Saturday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tyrion gathers more information on a night out with his friends.

So the next evening, after they’d had enough beer to make them mellow but not drunk, and were talking about their latest projects, Tyrion told them about the book he was doing on Petyr Baelish. As he began talking about it, both Edmure and Benjen looked at him as if they’d had buckets of cold water flung on their heads.

“I suppose you met my sister there,” Edmure began, sounding resigned. 

“Yes, I met both Lysa and her son.” Tyrion said with equanimity.

“I suppose she was all over him,” Edmure said, sounding almost glum.

“Correct,” Tyrion replied. “But what of it?”

“He’s always used the affection she had for him, that’s why! He wrote to her after he finished his MBA from Harvard; Uncle Brynden, who was visiting her, saw the letter and told me about it. We didn’t dare tell Dad—he would have been furious. That’s when she spoke to one of the Royces—Nestor, I think, or was it Bronze Yohn?—to interview him. She’d just got engaged to Jon Arryn.”

“So she gave him a leg up. So what?” Renly challenged Edmure.

“So what? I’ll tell you so what!” Edmure said, suddenly getting angry. “Did you know, when Catelyn and Brandon got engaged, he actually told Brandon he and Cat were lovers to break up the engagement? Brandon refused to believe him and laughed at him; Petyr, who was a bit the worse for liquor, actually attacked him with a carving knife! Brandon was able to grab his wrist and get the knife away. And he grabbed Petyr and beat him with his fists. Lysa was livid, because Brandon was a bigger guy than Petyr. But I told her he’d insulted Cat by implying a relationship that did not exist. But Lysa refused to listen. God knows why she’s always carried a torch for him! And now he’s foisting a bastard by-blow of his on her and her family! I don’t know how she can take it.”

“I don’t think,” Tyrion said carefully, although he was furious at the description Edmure had given of Alayne, “that the young lady you describe is living with them or plans to do so. Your nephew said she was living elsewhere and has no plans to move in with them.”

Edmure grunted, while Benjen gave him a long and searching look. It was left to Renly to continue the discussion, which he did by asking somewhat lazily, “If Petyr was so crazy about Catelyn, how come he had a child by another woman? And why did she abandon the baby?”

“She was someone he met in Boston, when he was studying at Harvard,” Edmure explained. “He told Lysa he met her at a football match; they were both on their own and had a meal together afterwards. She was from Ireland; she’d come Stateside to live with relatives and complete her education. They hit it off; they used to meet in secret. She even went to the ratty little apartment he had somewhere in town. He proposed to her; they planned to elope, because she told him her father would never accept his proposal. And then her father found out—he’d been having her followed—and took her away. Of course, Petyr was given yet another beating; he never saw nor heard from this girl (Rosie, he called her) for years, not until she sent him this letter some six years later, telling him about her daughter. And he asked for Lysa’s help yet again. She was a trustee at the orphanage where the girl was an inmate; she helped him get the paperwork through. There was a birth certificate and a letter and what not. This was one instance when I felt Lysa was doing the right thing; and I thought it would have opened her eyes to the kind of man Petyr was. He wasn’t a romantic hero carrying a torch for Catelyn; he was just an ordinary bloke.”

“So, your sister’s marriage to Baelish?” Tyrion prompted him.

Edmure sighed. “My father arranged Lysa’s marriage to Jon Arryn; Dad insisted on it. Arryn had lost two young relatives in Vietnam; he had Harry, whose father had died during basic training and whose mother had died in childbirth. He needed an heir and a young wife to produce one, act as his hostess, bring up Harry, all that sort of thing. Oh yes, Lysa had a pretty good life; a nice house, an excellent staff of servants, all the money and jewels and fine things in the world. But she was always romantic; she had a giant crush on that brother of yours, Jaime. He even came courting once—she could hardly get a word out edgewise. Catelyn had to do all the talking and get him to dance with Lysa; he kept asking Uncle Brynden for war stories! And Petyr and I kept laughing our guts out. Of course, he enlisted soon afterwards, and Lysa cried her eyes out almost, the silly girl. And when Brandon died, she was so certain Jaime would not come back, she became quite hysterical. And of course, of all the tasteless things to do at that time, Petyr wrote to Catelyn; not to condole with her on Brandon’s death, but to ask her to marry him. He was a sophomore in college!” And Edmure shook his head, exasperated.

“Did she show you the letter?” Tyrion asked, quietly.

“She didn’t know he wrote; I saw the letter and destroyed it, after showing it to my father. He wrote to her two years later, when she married Ned; it was the same sort of letter, begging her to marry him and make him the happiest of men. No, she didn’t see this one either; I saw it and destroyed it. I could see she really liked Ned; they’d both gone through hell when Brandon died. They kept writing to each other; he was in ‘Nam and she was back home in Riverrun. I have no idea what they wrote about, but they wrote at least twice or thrice a week. I used to post the letters for her and give her the letters he sent. And no; I didn’t open those letters or show those to Dad!”

“She used to keep writing—to me, to Lya, to Dad—after Brandon died. She even came up to Boston to visit us. Dad was touched—he really liked her.” Benjen spoke finally. “When Lya… disappeared, while Ned and Cat were honeymooning, Dad almost died from a heart attack. I just couldn’t cope; I wouldn’t have known what to do if they hadn’t come home at once.” He took a long swallow of his drink. He’d only been fourteen or fifteen then, Tyrion remembered—just a schoolboy.

“Lysa got married around that time; I don’t think we heard from Petyr on that occasion!” Edmure remarked acerbically. Tyrion did not recall attending that wedding; it must have been around the time Jaime’s plane went down in ‘Nam and he became a prisoner of war.

“Of course, Ned and Cat had a pretty bad time a year or two later, when their new-born baby girl disappeared?” Renly prodded. He looked alert and keen, as if he had not just consumed three bottles of beer.

“That was really horrible,” Benjen said quietly. “It killed Dad. We hadn’t been able to find Lya—she used to love to go off riding on her own. She used to do that more and more often after Brandon died. And one day, when she was on one of her rides, she just… didn’t come home. And while we have this investigation going on—everyone who knew her, from Barbrey Dustin and Bethany Bolton to the Manderlys and the Umbers and Mormonts and Reeds being questioned by the cops and the FBI for two years or more—Catelyn, who had Robb a year after the wedding, with no fuss whatsoever, goes to the hospital, has a lovely baby girl and is about to come home with the baby when she just disappeared. Everyone thought it had something to do with Lya’s disappearance, but I didn’t think so. And I was proved right.” He said, and took another gulp of his drink.

“How?” Tyrion asked.

“Well, a month or two after Ned and Catelyn’s baby girl disappeared and just after we’d buried Dad, we got a letter from a Colonel Dayne. He said he’d seen a girl who looked like Lya, living somewhere in a farmhouse in Arizona, with a child. Of course, the lot of us—Ned, Catelyn, baby Robb and I—got train tickets and went to Arizona. Colonel Dayne was able to guide us to the farmhouse. It appeared it had been taken on rent by Rhaegar Targaryen—your dad used to be his dad’s financial advisor, Tyrion—and Lya was there. He’d had her kidnapped; he was a married man, whose wife had just given him two lovely kids. We never knew why he kidnapped Lya, brainwashed her (don’t ask me how he did that!) and when we found her… she’d been living there with him and their three-year-old boy; she’d had the baby practically on her own. They were both ill with fever; the stupid fool Targaryen had left her there while he drove to town for a doctor. He didn’t get to town, because he died in a car crash. By the time we got there, she was near death. We couldn’t save her, but we saved the boy. I think having Jon as part of the family took away some of Catelyn and Ned’s grief at losing their daughter, but it was still a shock.”

The evening ended on an unusually sombre note; Tyrion had often known it to end with himself and friends being pushed and shoved into taxis by passers-by; this time, they bade each other farewell quietly. Tyrion asked Benjen, who was prone to take off for parts unknown without notice, how long he planned to stay in the States, and Benjen said he would be around for a month or more. “Edmure’s getting married, finally,” he said with a smile, “so I have to stand by him. I guess Petyr and Lysa will be there; I think she plans to pre-empt you, old man,” he said, as Edmure stuttered, embarrassed.

“Who’s the lucky girl?” Tyrion enquired, with some curiosity. 

“She’s one of the Freys—Roslin, right?” Benjen prompted, with a grin.

Edmure nodded, speechlessly.

That night, Tyrion began to note down the information he’d got from Robin Arryn and Edmure Tully. And for some reason, he also began writing down what Benjen had said. He wondered how Renly, of all people, had known about the disappearance of Ned and Catelyn’s baby girl—and then he remembered that Robert, his brother-in-law and Renly’s brother, was a school friend of Ned Stark’s. They’d endured the rigours of prep school, college, ROTC and ‘Nam together. He made plans to check up on the Lyanna Stark kidnapping and the Stark baby’s disappearance before he met Baelish for the book.


	4. Sunday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More information received at a social gathering--and Alayne gets lucky too!

The next day, he was woken early by a phone call from Jaime. “Rise and shine, little brother!” the older man said, cheerfully. “Brienne asked me to call—she thought you may have forgotten that we’re lunching en famille today.”

“Whaddya mean, en famille? I met Dad on Thursday; he said nothing about a lunch!” Tyrion exclaimed, not feeling too pleased. He’d hoped to go out for a long, lazy breakfast at Pegasus; the girls did a nice scrambled egg and croissant with strong black coffee.   
“That’s because Dad isn’t coming for lunch, you dope; it’s just Brienne, Cersei, Robert, Stannis, me and you. Dad has the doubtful pleasure of Joffrey’s company,” Jaime responded with a laugh.

Tyrion groaned; his sister was his least favourite person in the world, and with good reason. But then, he remembered that both Robert and Stannis might be able to tell him about the Stark baby’s disappearance; he did not know why the story had got to him. So he agreed to be there at twelve.  
Tyrion was happily sipping away at a vodka tonic when Robert and Cersei arrived, driven by Stannis. Both of them had lost their licences for driving under the influence; Tyrion did not know how Stannis coped with them, because he could hear Cersei screeching and Robert bellowing before the car drew to a halt outside Jaime’s front door.

He could see his sister was in a temper when she walked in, gave him a dirty look and demanded a drink. When Jaime handed her a lemonade, she almost flung the glass in his face, till he grabbed her hand. “Just be careful, Cersei; if you throw anything at me, I’ll have you in jail for assaulting an officer. And I’ll see to it that Dad doesn’t get you out this time.” He sounded stern when he said this, which was why she took her drink and sat in one corner of the living room, not saying a word for a minute or more.

Robert walked in, complaining loudly to Stannis, who responded with silence. Robert greeted Jaime and Tyrion loudly and warmly; he complained when given a Coke, while Stannis accepted a tomato juice with a quiet word of thanks. Brienne was making a fish stew that all of them liked and Jaime had brought a dessert that he thought Cersei would enjoy. They talked of inconsequential things—what the children were doing this summer; the latest case Jaime had solved; the business outlook and how Baratheon Brothers was coping with it and Tyrion’s latest project—the book on Petyr Baelish.

It was this last subject that led to Tyrion telling them what Benjen had told him the night before, while he’d been busy gathering information on Baelish’s relationships with the Tully siblings. Stannis gave a quick nod and put his spoon down as he prepared to speak while Robert agreed vociferously. “Yes that was quite a horrible time—Lya disappearing like that; no news of her for months, then the baby vanishing from the hospital nursery and then we found out what had become of poor Lyanna. I don’t know how they all held it together—Ned and Catelyn and Benjen. Poor Rickard Stark died without discovering what had become of his daughter. And we still don’t know what became of the baby.”

“It was all over the papers,” Cersei said, with a sniff. “All those stories about Rhaegar Targaryen—I would never have believed him capable of kidnapping young girls if they hadn’t found her in the farm house. But then, they were a crazy family.”

“You must have been there, Robert—you’d come back from ‘Nam back then, hadn’t you? Did Baelish write or get in touch with Catelyn Stark?” Tyrion asked casually. 

Robert shook his head. “We had the FBI camped in Winterfell; the phone line was tapped; the mail was opened every day. If he wrote, we would have all known about it. Lysa was to get married a month or two after Catelyn had her daughter; she had a very quiet wedding. I had to be there for Ned; Stannis was still in ‘Nam, so I brought Renly with me to the wedding. It was more like a wake.”

“Just how did that baby disappear from the nursery?” Jaime asked, his professional interest piqued.

“That’s the problem—no one could tell just when it happened. There was a change of shift just as the time allotted for visiting hours was getting over. So the nurse who was in charge of the nursery was shooing away visitors, while her relief took her time to get there. And when Lysa arrived to take the baby to Catelyn, the child was gone.”

“Lysa was in Boston?” Tyrion asked, surprised.

“Yes—she stayed with Ned and Cat, to look after Robb. He was three and a handful. And the old boy (Rickard Stark) was unwell, so Lysa was kept quite busy. I stayed around to lend a hand—played with Robb, ran errands. I was at a loose end after ‘Nam—no plans.”

“So Catelyn was to take the baby home that day? Who was at the hospital with her?”

“Ned and Lysa—he was driving the car; she was helping Cat pack and get the baby’s things together. I was with young Robb and Benjen was with his dad. Catelyn had just finished packing when Lysa went to get the baby and found her gone.”

“Why on earth,” Cersei demanded, glaring at Tyrion, “are you asking so many bloody questions about the disappearance of a mere baby?”

“I’m not just interested in the disappearance of a mere baby,” Tyrion remarked calmly, digging into Brienne’s fish stew, closing his eyes and masticating with pleasure. “The disappearance of Lyanna Stark and her niece, although three years apart, would have made news, right? It’s another matter that in Casterly Rock, you and I, Cersei, were totally taken up with Jaime being a prisoner in ‘Nam and were paying no attention to what was happening in the rest of the country. But Petyr Baelish, who wrote to Catelyn when Brandon died and when she married Ned, did not write to her, offering his help, when he read about her sister-in-law or daughter. Robert was there on the spot…”

“Till the old man died,” Robert said with a sigh. “I knew Ned would need me when I read about Lya disappearing, so I just went to Winterfell without an invite. He’d been there when our parents died in an air crash when we were at school together. Stannis kept writing to me, asking for updates—you were a bloody nuisance, you know old man? And so did Renly. I kept in touch with the cop in charge of the baby-napping case, Jorah Mormont; he was quite upset about the lack of leads. It’s still an open case, I think…”

“Just what was Petyr Baelish doing at this time, Tyrion? You must know, since you’re writing the book on him,“ Brienne said, glancing at Jaime’s absorbed expression.

“Let’s see—our man had a fight with Brandon; pulled a knife on him, according to Edmure Tully. This was a year before Brandon died in ‘Nam. At the time of Brandon’s death, Baelish was still in college—a sophomore. He would have just graduated when Catelyn and Ned Stark married two years later. He wrote to her on both those occasions, proposing marriage. And then he did a postgrad in management at Harvard, just after the Starks married. And when he left Harvard, he wrote to Lysa, who was going to marry Jon Arryn, who got him interviewed at her husband’s firm.”

“And she was with her sister, who was going to have the baby that disappeared so suddenly,” Stannis finally spoke up.

“Hmm, yes,” Jaime said, grinning slightly, with his eyes closed. “I remember visiting them at Riverrun before I left for ‘Nam. I spent the whole evening talking to her uncle about his adventures during the Second World War—he was dropped behind enemy lines, you know?” He sounded almost wistful as he said this. “I don’t remember her very well—a giggly girl, who kept glancing at me and blushing. And Edmure and Petyr—he was a small chap, not very big-built at all. And Catelyn was managing the lot of them. Hoster Tully was in Washington; I think I was sent up with some geegaws for the girls.”

“He was trying to marry you off to Lysa, you idiot,” Cersei snapped. “I told you what he and Dad were planning, all those years ago. And you ran off to   
‘Nam, instead of telling Dad you wouldn’t marry her! You really were an ass, Jaime. Still are, as a matter of course.”   
Jaime threw back his head and laughed when she said that, as did Robert.

“So you were there, Jaime? What did you think of the Tullys and young Baelish?” Tyrion demanded, feeling excited.

“Well, Catelyn was very much the lady of the manor; she was the one in charge. Lysa did as she was told; she was very young then—sixteen or seventeen? I couldn’t tell. Petyr would have been the same age as her, although he looked much younger. Edmure—he was about your age and a bit of a brat. I was more interested in talking to their uncle, so I was polite to the girls and ignored the two boys. They kept looking at Lysa and laughing. Catelyn even organized some records and got me to dance with Lysa; she stood up with me once, and then danced the rest of the evening with her uncle and the boys. So, Cersei, you might well be right for once!”

“You know I’m always right, you idiot,” Cersei snapped, irritated and almost crying with rage. “I could see how Dad was operating and I told you what he was up to.” She slammed her way out of the dining room and went to the rest room to wash her tear-stained face.

“What’s up with her?” Brienne almost whispered.

“Our analyst convinced her she’s been drinking because she feels guilty about Jaime going to ‘Nam and being taken prisoner. She’s been mad at the analyst ever since and even angrier with Jaime. She’s been fighting with me because she wants us both to dump the guy and forget about getting off the bottle, and I’m not bloody doing it. I’m feeling almost as good as I used to before the war, and I don’t want to lose that ever again. Things got so bad after the last session that we sent the kids to Stannis’ place and asked him to drive us here.”

Cersei was much quieter after she returned; Tyrion almost felt sorry for her. As they were leaving, he spoke to Jaime, “I think you should tell her why you volunteered to go to ‘Nam—she needs to know the truth. Now that I recall, she was in very poor shape when we learnt you were taken prisoner—Dad had to send her back to the Rock, with me as escort. And she kept cursing me all the way there. She was never the best big sister in the world to me, you know, but she did run the Washington house and Dad’s social life pretty well until then. So, big brother, you better talk to her and soon. Find out what’s really at the back of her drinking.”

“Will do,” Jaime said, as he escorted his brother out. 

That evening, when he let himself into his flat, he was surprised and delighted to find Alayne lying fully clothed on his sitting room couch, fast asleep. She woke up when he drew closer, and asked sleepily what time it was. When he told her, she yawned and subsided, saying “You have no idea what a time I’ve had.”

“Tell me all about it—I’m going to make you some tea.” He said, trotting into the kitchen. He decided he would have a cup as well.

“Now I know why I love you so; you’re such a sweet, thoughtful guy,” she murmured sleepily into the cushions. But she was up and rubbing the sleep out of her eyes when he brought two mugs of tea into the sitting room.

“So what happened? Big party last night?”

“Not really—I didn’t go to the party,” she said calmly. “I got to the Eyrie at a reasonable hour; they’d just had breakfast and dad was lazing around in his dressing gown. I gave him a manicure and pedicure—I’m surprised that Lysa hasn’t taken on the job. And then we had lunch and chatted a bit; I went to my room for a nap. And that’s when I realised that Dad had got all the stuff I had in the farm-house and stored it in my room in the Eyrie. I could have really lost my shirt with him by then, because the only place not covered in boxes was my bed, but I didn’t. I decided to clear the stuff out after the nap. Lysa and the boys were out for the day; Dad had gone off to meet some people after lunch. So I began working on the boxes and was still at it when Lysa, Dad and the boys got back. Of course, Lysa had organized something for the four of them to do in the evening—a party at the Redforts’. Mychel Redfort, that so-and-so, was the one chasing Mya Stone all of last year, and then he threw her over for Myranda’s cousin, whom he married. Of course, I wasn’t included, because Lysa hadn’t thought I’d be there. I haven’t been up to the Eyrie in an age; I’ve just been so mad at Dad! So I told her I was too busy to party; I had to get the boxes out of the way and would get them done that evening. Which is just what I did, and treated myself to a nice poached egg and toast for dinner. And then I called up Sister Mordane.”

“Oh—the lady at the orphanage.”

“Exactly—a lot of the stuff I had was almost as good as new. I’m very good at keeping my things tidy,” she said, almost smugly, making him laugh. “No; I’m serious—I was so grateful to have nice things when I left the orphanage that I kept everything as neat as a pin. So I was able to offer her lots of hand-me-downs for the kids—books and toys and clothes I didn’t need. Of course, I had to leave the city at an unholy hour; Dad, Lysa and the boys got home very late and I left a note for him in the study. I even called him back after I got to the orphanage.” She sounded very pleased with herself indeed.

“And how does this help the purpose of our enquiry?” he asked gently. He didn’t want to prick her bubble too hard; he loved to see her laughing and happy.

“Well, I saved Dad’s nail clippings from the manicure and pedicure—I put them in a little box instead of throwing them away, like I usually do. And I kept the box close to me till they left the apartment; I kept thinking he knew what I was up to. I was able to get my file out of the orphanage with Sister Mordane’s help; I told her I was planning to marry and I needed to know about my mother, so that I could tell my prospective husband and future in-laws the truth about my birth. She was thrilled to hear about my marrying and even more delighted to know that I wanted to tell the truth about myself; she wanted an invite to the wedding, the dear, good woman!”

“She’ll be there in the front pew,” Tyrion promised her.

“Of course, Dad produced notarized copies of the documents my mother sent him, but the orphanage insisted he deposit the originals if he wanted to take me, which he did. So she kept the notarized copies of everything, but gave me the originals. And she was over the moon with the hand-me-downs; made me stay for lunch and talk to the kids. And then I had a long drive back, which is why I was sleeping.” 

“What did your dad say when you told him where you were going?”

“Oh, he couldn’t understand why I would go back to that horrid place. I told him I had many fond memories of Sister Mordane; she was really good to me. And then he wanted to know why I couldn’t give my stuff to the orphanages in the city; I had to remind him that Lysa was a trustee at the orphanage where I had been an inmate. It would do her good to have a step-daughter donate things she’d outgrown. It was very exhausting and embarrassing; luckily, the phone’s in the office and they let me stay there alone while I was talking to Dad.”

“So now what?” he asked her.

“Well, I’m sending Dad’s nail clippings and my own off to the lab tomorrow. And then I’m sending these original papers to a handwriting expert. I’m going to give your address for all the reports that come in.” She was serious as she spoke—he nodded in agreement.

He told her what he had learned from Edmure Tully; she expressed surprise at her father’s behaviour. “He’s never talked about Catelyn Tully to me, ever.” She said, astonished. “He was writing to her, proposing to her, and then he just does not talk about her for years. And then he marries her younger sister. I swear to you Tyrion—I really don’t get my father at all at times.”


	5. Monday to Friday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The results of the paternity and handwriting tests come in; Alayne and Tyrion get a shock and they change their strategy...

She was as good as her word the next day, sending off the two parcels before she left for work and leaving the receipts with him. He finished off the stories he’d been working on, and began preparing a list of questions for Petyr Baelish, whom he would meet later in the week. He planned to go easy on the man at first; ask about his family (the grandfather and father Alayne had mentioned) as well as the mother for whom Alayne said she was named, find out how he came to be brought up with the Tully kids, what he thought of each of them and yes, pick up on the reference to the old country Baelish had made in their first meeting. He planned to keep it nice, easy and sympathetic. 

After he’d got the questionnaire out of the way, he began working on shorter pieces, which kept him occupied for the rest of the week. He’d just got the last of these finished, and was getting it faxed to his client, when two envelopes arrived, addressed to Ms Alayne Baelish. He left them there for Alayne to open; she would come that evening for dinner. He was determined to order out; she wouldn’t say no to Chinese, which she loved.  
She came in and they greeted each other as if they were meeting after a twenty-year absence, instead of a four-day break. After their first paroxysms of joy and passion had subsided, she looked at the mail that had come for her and opened it impatiently. One was from the DNA lab; the second was from the handwriting expert-cum detective. Both combined to give her quite a shock.

Tyrion didn’t realize what she was going through; all he saw was his girlfriend, looking at the letter from the DNA lab, with tears pouring down her cheeks. She put the letter down and stared at him with empty eyes. He wanted her to say something, to tell him what the letter contained. When she didn’t do that, he pried the paper out of her hands and read what it stated. It said, in the baldest possible words, that the person from whom Sample A had been taken was not the father of the person who had provided Sample B. 

He put the paper down and held her in his arms. He did not speak. He had no words left. He just held her at first and then gently kissed away her tears. She responded by hugging him; she still did not speak. Silently, she opened the second envelope and read the letter and handed it to him, still saying nothing. She sat there, her head in her hands, but dry-eyed, as he looked at her and then at the letter.

The handwriting expert-cum-detective had the following report: No one by the name of Rose O’Brien had lived at the convent where it was claimed she’d had the baby. No such child was delivered at that convent on the day in question. He’d even used the handwriting sample she’d given him to show to the faculty of various Boston women’s colleges; first, no one by the name of Rose O’Brien had been a student at any such college and second, no one had recognized the handwriting. He’d send copies of her note across to his associates in other states; perhaps her handwriting would be recognized somewhere.

Alayne spoke suddenly:  
“So much money spent, on all these reports, and for what?’ 

He sighed and said, “It’s true; you haven’t got the answers you hoped for, but you have some answers. Let’s see where we can go with them, shall we?”

They ate their dinner quietly and went to bed. He held her in his arms all night; he wanted her to know that he would always love her, no matter whose daughter she was. He loved the person she had become.

The next day, she put aside her tears and feelings of hopelessness to look at the situation as an investigative journalist. Perhaps her father had lied to her about being her father. It seemed very likely, as Rose O’Brien was a creature of very little substance. It then became necessary to discover her real parents. Sister Mordane had, when giving her the original contents of her file, also given her the clothes she’d worn and the baby blanket she was wrapped in when she was found on the doorstep of the orphanage. These might provide a clue to where she’d come from; otherwise, she had no leads.

Tyrion then began to think seriously about the case of the Stark baby who had disappeared so suddenly from her bassinet in the hospital nursery. He began to wonder if he could reschedule his interview with Petyr Baelish; he felt he might well use a knife or a gun on the man who’d lied to Alayne about being her father. And then he got a call from Lyn Corbray, asking for a rescheduling of the interview; Mr Baelish had to rush to Georgia over the weekend—he had a big presentation scheduled with a group of investors in Arryn Securities’ latest ventures. He agreed to the rescheduling at once; it would give him time to read up on the Stark case.

He spoke to Alayne of his plans, telling her what he’d learned of the Stark baby’s disappearance from Benjen and Robert. She listened to him in silence and told him of her own plans, to find out more about the clothes and the blanket that she’d had when she arrived at the orphanage. “They don’t have hospital tags,” she noted, “and even the manufacturer’s tags are absent. Were these made at home? This is a grey baby outfit,” she showed it to him, “and a red-and-blue knitted blanket. Very nicely stitched and knitted—I can tell. Whoever did this knew how to knit and stitch very well indeed. From the little I’ve seen of Lysa, I haven’t seen her touch a needle to knit or sew. But maybe I should talk to the Stone girls and Robin to learn more about her hobbies, if any. I can catch up with him at the Pegasus when I go to meet Bella and Mya—he always goes there for a coffee or an ice-cream.”

He agreed, and they parted; he went off to comb through the musty morgues of the newspaper world, while she went to the café, to talk to the girls she’d known in school. He began by looking for news on annual events, such as debutant balls, the Army & Navy football game, the major horse races and show opening nights. He was not surprised to find Cersei and Jaime there at almost every event; Rhaegar Targaryen and his wife Elia were also frequently photographed on such occasions. It was mentioned, in passing, that Rhaegar worked at the Pentagon and that Elia was associated with the Martells of Southern California, owners of vineyards and resorts. Catelyn Tully was photographed on a few such occasions, dressed in an off-shoulder gown of an indeterminate colour (these were black-and-white photos) and accompanied by an extremely handsome man who oozed animal magnetism. This must be Brandon Stark, Tyrion realised—there was a photo of him, taken front-face; the expression in his eyes—so devil-may-care and reckless—was such that he could not look away for some moments. It reminded him only too vividly of what Jaime had been like, before ‘Nam.  
Since the newspaper morgue belonged to a daily popular all over the eastern seaboard, Tyrion was able to locate photographs of Ned Stark’s wedding to Catelyn Tully. It had not been a big affair; but the business associates (and their families) of the Tully and Stark clans had been invited. Tyrion recalled an invitation arriving at Casterly Rock and being promptly shredded to bits by Cersei after she had snatched it out of his hands. The photos of Catelyn Stark, taken on these occasions, were extremely sharp and clear—Tyrion could not help but notice the resemblance to Alayne. The sharpness of features was the same, although Mrs Stark’s expression was serious, attentive and grave, not the soft dreaminess he associated with Alayne.

He checked out photographs of the Tully-Arryn wedding that took place some three years later; the Starks were conspicuous by their absence. Robert was there, burly and bearded, along with Renly; the bride looked pretty but unremarkable. The groom, who was in his late forties, looked distinguished.

He looked through other photographs that featured the Starks; these were taken more recently and were in colour. There was one where the Winterfell Wolves had won an all-state football trophy; Robb Stark had captained the side and was photographed along with his proud parents. His father looked grave; his mother was smiling faintly. Again, Tyrion noted the resemblance to Alayne. He requested a reprint of that photograph, and one of her taken at her wedding.

When he reached his apartment, he found Alayne there, busily scrambling eggs, while sausages sizzled in a pan and croissants warmed in the oven. He sniffed the air ostentatiously and approvingly; she must have good news. She talked as they ate—she found Robin at the Pegasus, as she had expected. He was quite at the end of his patience with his mother and Petyr Baelish, as he made clear to her. He hated the fact that she’d hardly spent any time with them when she visited, and he blamed his mother for not checking with her when and if she was coming that weekend. And he was annoyed that she’d gone off so early the next day, while they were sleeping.

“So I told him the truth—that I had to go out to the orphanage, to meet Sister Mordane, because this was the only day in the week when both of us were free. I told him I was very annoyed with Dad because he’d brought all my stuff from the farmhouse to the Eyrie, instead of putting it into storage; I wanted it out of that room, doing some good in the world. He said he could understand that; the maids had finally been able to clean my room after the boxes were removed. And then I told him what I learned at the orphanage—not about the letter and the papers, but about the baby clothes and the blanket. I showed them to him, and told him that Sister Mordane had given them to me, because a baby girl who had briefly lived at the orphanage had been found on the doorstep with these items. And Sister wanted to know where she came from. He told me that his mother had made the same red-and-blue check blanket for him, and his Aunt Catelyn made the same for his cousins. He’d seen the one she’d made for young Rickon, who refused to let go of it, even when he was six years old. And he’d seen the baby outfits his aunt had made for his cousins; his mother had made blue-and-white outfits for him. I asked him what the colours meant; he said these were the family colours, from way back in Europe. And he became very excited and asked me if I had ever heard of one of his cousins going missing when she was a baby. I told him I hadn’t heard the story, so he told me. He said he’d heard it from Robb and his uncle Edmure; he did a rather muddled job of telling the story. And then he realised he’d have to go home, said a very affectionate farewell to me, paid his bill and left.”

He told her what he’d done at the morgue, and showed her the reprints of photos featuring Catelyn Stark. She stood before the mirror on the mantelpiece—it was really elaborate, with gold scrollwork on the sides and a lion standing full-face at the top—to look at her face and compare it with the photographs. He pulled up a stool and stood alongside, looking into the mirror from the side.

“I can see the resemblance,” he said quietly. She simply sighed in response.

“Tyrion, this case won’t be solved on the basis of resemblances. We need hard evidence to make our point.”

He thought for a while before he spoke again. He’d climbed off the stool and they had walked away from the mirror. “Robert mentioned a Jorah Mormont who was working on the case. Let’s call him up and arrange a meeting.”

“Right now?” she asked, surprised.

“Yes, why not?” he said. He called Directory Enquiries in Boston, and got Jorah Mormont’s home and office numbers. He tried him at the office and found him at work. Alayne sat, her hands tightly clenched in her lap, as he told Mormont he thought he’d solved the case of the missing Stark baby.  
Of course, Captain Mormont was sceptical, but his scepticism gradually wore off as Tyrion quickly told his tale. “Why don’t you come up to Boston with the young lady? And please bring all the evidence with you,” was Mormont’s parting shot. Alayne sat there, breathing deeply, smiling and shaking her head, as she looked at him.

“I don’t know where you get your chutzpah from, Tyrion; I really don’t,” she said in a wobbling voice, and then began to cry softly. He ran to her and put his arms around her, hugging her tight. “I love you,” is all he said.

They spent some time packing for their trip to Boston, before they went to bed that night. She did not have to go in to work the next day; his meeting with Petyr Baelish was for the coming Tuesday.


	6. Saturday and Sunday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alayne and Tyrion meet Jorah Mormont and Robin causes a furore.

They took the early-morning train to Boston—Alayne was too nervous to drive. He kept talking to her throughout the journey and she responded to him, sometimes with a smile, sometimes almost mechanically. They got rooms at a small hotel in town and then went to meet Jorah Mormont at his office. He was there, seated at his desk, going through what looked like an ancient file. He looked up as Alayne and Tyrion walked in; Tyrion saw his eyes widen as he looked at Alayne. He swallowed as he got up and ushered them to their chairs opposite him and called out for three coffees.  
They did not speak till the coffees had arrived; then Jorah Mormont began by addressing Tyrion, who had made the appointment with him. “What convinced you that your girlfriend here is the missing Stark baby?”

Tyrion sipped at his coffee as he spoke, “Well, when I began working on Petyr Baelish’s campaign biography as a ghost writer, Alayne asked me to question him about her mother’s identity. He’d never spoken of her to Alayne.” He hesitated to use the name of the mythical woman or imply that Petyr was, in any way, Alayne’s father.

“Is this true, Miss… Alayne? You say that Mr Baelish never spoke to you of your mother?”

“No—he implied that their break-up had been very traumatic for him. He told me, when I was a little girl, that he would speak of it to me when I was older. But he never did—not when I left for college or went on to graduate school. Finally, when Tyrion and I began living together, and I realised how deeply I felt for him, I knew I needed to know more about my mother. But by then, I was no longer living with my father; moreover, he was in the process of getting married to his deceased boss’s widow. He was trying to persuade me to come live with them in what would be her son’s home, work in the same company and marry someone he’d selected for me. Although I was glad he had found someone he cared about, I was unwilling to have him pull me into this new life that he had made for himself. I was an adult now, educated and able to think and act for myself. And so, I chose my job and a place to live with friends. And since Tyrion was to ghost this biography, I thought he would be the best person to ask questions about my mother.”

“But this meeting with Mr Baelish to begin work on his biography did not actually take place, Mr Lannister?” Jorah asked surprised.

“No, it didn’t,” Tyrion admitted. “We were in a preliminary meeting when Mrs Arryn walked in and proceeded to monopolize Mr Baelish. I left, after making an appointment with his secretary. And her son and nephew followed me out. We got talking, and Robin told me some of the circumstances in which Alayne had been brought to live with Mr Baelish.”

“Yes, you mentioned the letter from the fictitious Rose O’Brien,” Jorah remarked, pursing his lips. “Your father never mentioned her name to you, Miss Alayne? And this Sister Mordane Tyrion spoke of—the woman who ran the orphanage where you lived—she said nothing to you about the circumstances in which you were leaving?”

“No to both questions, sir—I was only a child of six or thereabouts. All she said was that I was leaving the orphanage to live with a kind gentleman, who would be a father to me. As for Dad, he never spoke about my mother, but he did tell me I was his daughter in every sense of the word. The first time I heard this name was when Tyrion told me what Robin had said. And I was furious—my father had not even thought fit to share her name with me.” Alayne’s voice wobbled; Tyrion thought she might burst into tears, but she held herself together admirably.

“And then?” Captain Mormont asked.

“Well, Tyrion suggested a paternity test; I’d read up about them for an article I’d worked on, so I understood how it worked. Luckily for me, Dad hates cutting his own nails; he hates it even more when he has to go to a salon and have it cut. So when I went across to the Eyrie, he was having a quiet lazy morning while I cut his nails. And then I sent his nail parings, and mine, to be tested; I explained that I was looking for my mother, so that any genetic information that was not common to my father and myself was to be highlighted in the report.”

“And you also went to the orphanage?”

“Where I was given the letter and the baby things. Sister Mordane felt I could handle it—about my mother.”

“And you sent this off to a handwriting expert?”

“He’s not just a handwriting expert; he’s also a detective. Someone by the name of Sandor Clegane. He’s quite good; known to be relentless and all that. One of my colleagues at the Tri-State Times did a story on him some years ago. I sent him the letter and told him what Tyrion had learned about my mother’s background from Edmure Tully. I asked him to have the handwriting checked across the Boston colleges for women, especially the ones affiliated to the church.”

“And both responses—the DNA test and the handwriting sample…”

“Were both negative. The DNA lab said that there was no common genetic material that I shared with the man I’d called my father. Mr Clegane told me Rose O’Brien   
never went to a college in Boston—her name wasn’t on the rolls. And none of the professors and lecturers there recognized her handwriting. I was quite shaken by all this,” she said, with a little gasp.

“So then you looked at the baby clothes and blanket you were given…” he said softly.

“And I asked Robin about them—I didn’t really want to discuss this with Lysa,” she confessed, sounding sheepish.

“And you, Mr Lannister, went and looked at photographs in a morgue?” he asked quietly.

“Yes; I noticed the facial resemblance between Alayne and Mrs Stark immediately.” He said.

The captain sat quietly for a moment, and then he said, “I think it’s only fair that we inform the Starks of all this. It will help if we do a paternity test, with cheek swabs and all the rest. Shouldn’t take too long; I know a lab in town that will do it in two or three days. Why don’t the two of you stay on in town till Monday?”

Tyrion didn’t know what Alayne would have said to that, but he agreed for them both. He knew how much this meant to her. The captain told them he would speak to the Starks this evening; if they agreed to the tests, he’d arrange with the lab and let them know tonight. He took the number of their hotel and they left, feeling somewhat drained, yet relieved. They spent the day wandering the town, looking into the various museums. It was as if they were walking themselves into exhaustion. They had lunch at a museum café, and returned to their rooms to nap and wait for Mormont’s call.

When he called, he had some news for them. It appeared that Robin had been sufficiently excited by what Alayne said about the baby girl at the orphanage to call his eldest Stark cousin with the news. So Robb Stark had flown to New York, met Robin and gone to Alayne’s apartment, which she shared with the Stone sisters and Myranda Royce. There, Myranda had informed them that Alayne had gone off for the weekend with her boyfriend. And since Alayne had not introduced her friends or her family to said boyfriend (“Very dangerous, my dear—what if I had been the sort who killed pretty young things in bathtubs?” teased Tyrion), this revelation had caused quite a furore in the Eyrie, with Petyr Baelish sending photographs of his daughter to the police, asking that she be listed as a missing person, to be met with the response that she was a grown woman, who had ostensibly gone out of town with a friend. Moreover, she had not yet been gone twenty-four hours. Robb Stark had just returned to Winterfell with Robin in tow; the pair of them were regaling the rest of the family with how both Baelish and Mrs Arryn had responded to Alayne’s alleged disappearance. 

“Did Robin tell his mother and step-father about the baby clothes and the blanket?” Alayne asked Mormont.

“No; the mere fact that you were not in the city and had left with a person unknown was enough to upset Petyr Baelish. Mrs Arryn tried to insinuate all sorts of terrible things about your morals and so on, but the boys were not paying much attention to that.”

“Did neither of them ask why Robb Stark had suddenly flown into New York? And why on earth didn’t Robin tell him about the orphanage?”

“I think Robb wanted to meet you, Miss Alayne. He wanted to know what you knew. So when he heard my story, he asked me what I thought about your version of events. I told him I needed a paternity test to confirm your claims. And he urged his family to agree—he said it was the first time someone had come forward claiming to be the lost Stark girl.”

Alayne swallowed as she spoke into the phone. “Where do I go to submit a sample?”

“The technician will be at your hotel at seven in the morning tomorrow—he’ll take a swab from your cheek. There’s another going to Winterfell—they’ve all agreed to submit samples. You should know within the week.”

Alayne looked at Tyrion, her eyes large with fear and anxiety. “Should I stay here or return to New York?” she asked Jorah Mormont anxiously. 

He paused before he spoke. “If you were just going for a weekend with a guy you met, you’d return home, wouldn’t you? If you don’t, Baelish has the excuse of going to the cops, claiming that you’re missing.”

“You’re right, Captain—it’s what we should do, both of us. Go home and wait it out.”

So they spent the Sunday wandering the city—they had no desire to return to New York till the evening, when they would take the train back. They talked about Baelish—at least, Alayne did. She did not want to return to New York or talk to her father—she felt he had lied to her for as long as she had known him. And since she had realized this recently, it had hit her hard. But at the end of the day, although she did not want to talk to Baelish or see him ever again, she had decided that he had to be lulled into a sense of security, if not complacency.

“I must call him when I get back to Myranda’s this evening,” she told Tyrion. “I must explain that I’m still getting to know my boyfriend—when I’m certain the relationship is likely to be permanent, I will introduce him to my family. That should mollify him, I hope.”

Tyrion agreed; he, too, would have to keep his appointment with Baelish till they got the paternity results later in the week. 

“I’ll call you from work or a payphone after I’ve spoken to my father,” she said quietly. “Whatever you do, Tyrion, don’t let on that we’re an item. I could kill Robin—why, oh why is he such a bloody blabbermouth?”


	7. Monday to Thursday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An unexpected discovery...

Usually, they only spoke to each other occasionally during the working week—she had just started on her career and he relied on his work to pay his bills for the month. This distance was the fuel that ignited their passions over the weekends they spent together. But this time, she found ways and means to call him, after she’d spoken to Petyr Baelish and after Tyrion had met the man again for his first session on their book. She called from pay-phones; she seemed to be keen not to use the phone in the apartment she shared with her girl-friends. And she did not want to call him from work; she meant to reveal her relationship with him in her own good time to the world. She did not want to use him as a prop for her career; he meant too much to her for that.

She told him how worried and anxious and angry Baelish had sounded when he asked her about her boyfriend and why he hadn’t been introduced to him and the rest of the family—Mrs Arryn, Robin and Harry—or her friends.

“I told him I was dating someone in the same profession; we are in the early stages of our relationship and getting to know each other. I told him you were a bit older than me, had been in relationships that hadn’t worked out, were keen to commit but needed time to do so. And I told him I wanted to give you the time to come to know me and decide if we could have a relationship. And I would introduce you to all of them when we were both ready to commit. And I also told him I didn’t want to steal his thunder; he was getting married and my revelations would take the spotlight away from him. He pooh-poohed that, but I could tell he was mollified. He wanted me to come over the coming weekend; I said I would do that. I hope to heaven we get the test results before then.”

“We should.“ he said quietly. “Mormont says he’s told the lab he wants the results ASAP—he thinks he can bring a case of kidnapping against Baelish and Mrs Arryn.”

“Her as well?” she gulped. 

“Yes; she was there and she must have helped him sneak you out of the nursery.”

She sighed deeply. “Be careful of what you say to him when you meet him tomorrow. Don’t confront him; I have this absolute horror of your going ballistic on him.”

“I won’t; I will be courteous and so on. Don’t worry about me. Take care of yourself. I love you.”

“I’ll call tomorrow before I get to the apartment,” she said quietly. “I love you too and I miss you horribly.”

“Hmm—when this is over,” he said mischievously, “I plan to get down on my knees and ask you something.”

“Very well, darling; your request will be considered most favourably.” She laughed and he laughed with her. He was glad he’d cheered her up.

The next day, he had a meeting with Baelish in the afternoon. Tyrion asked him about his family background and how he came to be brought up with the Tully children.

“That isn’t a very long story,” Petyr laughed. “My grandfather was sent to New York from Russia to learn the banking business; ours was an old merchant family, you know. He spent a few years here, working in a bank. Before he returned home—this was just as the war began—he put most of the money he’d made into a farm upstate and hired someone to manage it for him. During the war years, he got married and was sent to the front. When the revolution began, he returned home, took his wife—his parents had died many years earlier and he had been brought up by relatives who owned a bank—and set sail for the States. He’d told her to bring her jewellery along—he was able to live quite well on his farm. Of course, he lost his job during the Depression, but he still had the farm and was able to give my father a good upbringing. Dad was old enough to join up when the war began—he served alongside the Tully brothers. He even managed to save Hoster’s life, on one occasion. Brynden, of course, was recruited by the OSS; my father ended up working with him after the war got over. My mother was a war bride—her family had escaped to England just after the civil war. My father continued to do a lot of hush-hush stuff while I was growing up; my mother ran the farm, brought me up and looked after my grandparents. It was after my grandparents died of old age and my mother died in an accident that Hoster Tully arranged for me to be brought up with his children. I must have been eight or ten, then.”

“And how did you get along with the Tully family?” Tyrion asked.

“Not too badly. Hoster spent most of his time travelling between Washington and Riverrun; he was into politics and diplomacy. He was there to give the orders and take decisions for us. Brynden was relegated to a desk job in Langley, which he hated; don’t ask me how I know this, but I do. He was the one who was most approachable; all of us—Cat, Lysa, Edmure and myself—went to him when we were in trouble. He began to travel abroad by the time I left for college. Catelyn—she pretty much ran the house and looked after all of us after her mother died. She and Lysa were very good to me, made me feel like a part of the family. Edmure—I got along well with him, until… Well, until I made the mistake of revealing how I felt about Catelyn to the world at large.”

“Oh? When was that?”

“When she got engaged to Brandon Stark. I think her father may have introduced the two of them and hoped to make a match of it. I didn’t understand why Catelyn liked this stranger so much; she kept talking about him when she came back on vacation from college. I was already very annoyed to hear so much about him. And then, when she graduated, they were engaged. I was livid—I felt Catelyn should marry someone who knew her well and liked her for who she was, not this bloody jock! And then I implied, when I spoke to Brandon Stark about breaking off the engagement, that Catelyn and I were lovers. Of course she denied it, because it wasn’t true. She’d been kind and affectionate—now I realise that she practically treated me very much as she treated Lysa and Edmure. But then… I had no relationship with my father worth speaking of; I’d spent all my life (other than my earliest years) in Riverrun with the Tullys and I liked it that way. Brandon laughed me off; that’s when I pulled a knife on him. I was so angry with him because he laughed at me and called me a twerp.” There were actually tears in Baelish’s eyes and a quaver in his voice as he said those words.

“And then?”

“He twisted the knife out of my hands and gave me a thrashing—he said he should call the cops and have me charged with an attempt to murder, but since Catelyn begged him to—she said I was only a schoolboy!—he’d let me off with a beating. And he did hit hard. I landed up in the hospital, bruised and bleeding, with all my things packed in boxes sent to the farmhouse in New York. Uncle Brynden stayed with me every night while I was there; he came with me and had me settled into the farmhouse when I was released. Lysa called, when I got to the farmhouse; she said she wasn’t  
even allowed to send me a get-well card. As for Edmure—he sent me a very angry letter, telling me I’d behaved like an idiot and how!”

“So then you lost touch with all of them?”

“Hmm? No—only with Catelyn, Edmure and their father. Lysa used to write to me from time to time when she went to college. Uncle Brynden would come check on me whenever he passed by the university where I was enrolled. Of course, he never mentioned Catelyn—he kept the talk to me and my studies. He spoke of my dad and my future. He advised me to get a job in business when I graduated. Then, when he began to travel outside the country, his visits stopped. But Lysa always wrote, telling me what was happening with the family and asking me what I was doing. I would almost have asked her to marry me—this was just after I finished my MBA at Harvard—but I thought better of it. Her father had made it clear he did not consider me worthy of his family. That’s when I decided to prove him wrong—I wanted to show him how far I could get on my own mettle. So I wrote to her and asked her if she knew where I could interview for a job in a brokerage. She’d just got engaged to Jon Arryn—he was a war-time buddy of her dad’s who’d lost two wives already. She arranged for me to interview here—and I’ve ended up bossing around the men who interviewed me!” He laughed loudly, almost startling Tyrion.

“You mentioned a daughter. Were you married earlier?” Tyrion asked with seeming uninterest.

“Married earlier? Oh, dear me, no! This was an indiscretion of my student years. I met Rose when I was at Harvard, at a football match. We bet on the outcome of the game—I forget which two sides were playing—and she won. We began to meet for the occasional play, a visit to a museum, a walk in the park, an evening spent in my apartment listening to music. We became lovers. Of course, I wanted to marry her—she was from an old-fashioned Irish-Catholic family. And then, her father found out about us. He came to my apartment when we were together and took her away by force. He had a couple of hoodlums with him. She tried to argue; he almost hit out at her, which is when I stepped in and got the second beating of my life. Luckily, I didn’t land up in hospital this time. I didn’t hear from Rose for at least six or seven years—until she wrote to me from Ireland, telling me that her father had come to her place to die and to tell her that he’d left her daughter in an orphanage in New York. I didn’t know she was pregnant; she was in the early stages when we were forced to part. Her father sent her somewhere to have the baby; he refused to get her an abortion. When the child was born, he told her it was born dead. And then he sent her to Ireland, to marry someone he’d selected for her.

“When she told me all this, I didn’t know what to think or do. I told Lysa the whole story and showed her the letter and other papers that Rose had sent. She was able to help me get my little girl out of the orphanage. I couldn’t spend all the time I’d have liked to with Alayne, but I made sure she got a good upbringing, with Lysa’s help and advice.”

“You mentioned you’d thought of marrying Lysa after you graduated, and then thought better of it. How much did this affair have to do with your thinking?”

“Now that you remind me of it, it had a lot to do with it. You see, Rose’s father had her followed and then he had me investigated. He knew about the fight with Brandon Stark and my break with the Tullys. So he made it obvious, when he had me beaten up, that he considered me a fortune hunter. Which was why I decided not to propose to Lysa then, indeed, not to marry at all until I made my money. And then, when I found out about Alayne, Lysa convinced me no woman would want to marry a man with a child, especially an illegitimate child.”

Their time together had run out by the time he finished telling the story. Tyrion made another appointment with him for Thursday—“I need to know about your career at Arryns and how you made your first millions!” Baelish obliged gladly. “I might also need to talk to your colleagues at Arryns, as well as Mrs Arryn, your daughter, the Tullys and perhaps your professors at Harvard?” Tyrion requested.

“Of course—I will have Corbray prepare a list for you; I’ll write the letters of introduction myself,” Baelish said happily.

That evening, when Alayne called, Tyrion was able to regale her with an account of his interview with her father. When she learned that Baelish had thought of proposing to Lysa Tully after he graduated from Harvard, Alayne wondered aloud, “Was this after he met my supposed mother?”

“Um, yes—he says that your supposed grandpa called him a fortune hunter, which is why he thought better of proposing to her.”

“So now you meet him on Thursday?”

“Yes; by then we should have some news from Mormont.”

On Thursday morning, Tyrion almost expected Mormont to call, but he reminded himself that the cop would call when he had the results. He always kept his answering machine switched on, so he would know Mormont had called and get back to him. So he went for his meeting with Baelish, this time in the morning—it would be a long discussion, because Baelish wanted to talk about the deals he’d done at Arryns. At the end of this, he would introduce Tyrion to the senior partners at Arryns, with whom he would talk later, to flesh out the campaign biography.

It was a long discussion—Baelish described his early years at Arryns and the friendly competition that prevailed between him and his fellow brokers to bag the largest number of subscribers to various issues of shares and bonds. He was a consistently high performer, managing to get three times as many clients as the other brokers. He lived in a Spartan apartment in New York in those days, only visiting the farm on weekends. “I’d hired someone to manage the farm when my father died in the early seventies and left it to me. He had gone abroad on business—Vietnam or Laos?—and came back in a box. The couple I hired had lost all three of their boys to the war, so that formed a bond.”

When Alayne became a part of his life, he arranged for her to spend her vacations on the farm. “Of course, she would insist on bringing along her girlfriends—the Stone sisters and Myranda Royce. She enjoyed wandering the countryside; the Kettleblacks couldn’t keep up with her, but the other three girls could. They would go biking, walking, swimming, you name it. I know I gave her a happy childhood.” He spoke with a certain fervent conviction there.

He continued to describe his working life at length and how he helped the firm deal with the various economic crises that had arisen in the last ten or fifteen years. 

As they neared the end of their meeting, Tyrion asked suddenly, “You didn’t have much of a personal life after Alayne moved in, did you? I checked you out in the newspapers and tabloids and I never saw you photographed or associated with any women.”

Baelish laughed. “Oh, there were plenty of well-connected families that wanted me to marry their girls, now that I was doing well. But I didn’t want a relationship. I had what I had always wanted—until Lysa’s husband died.”

“How did things change with Jon Arryn’s death?” Tyrion asked, as he was supposed to.

“Well, for one, neither Robin nor Harry was ready to take over. Robin still has a lot of growing up to do—and he has to work in the business if he is to head it someday. As for Harry, I don’t think he’s a bad sort, but he needs a good, strong-willed girl to bring him around. I hoped Alayne would do the job. But now it seems she has her own plans…”

The door to his office opened just as he finished speaking and Jorah Mormont walked in, followed by Jaime Lannister, who looked at his younger brother and brusquely pointed the way out. Tyrion refused to move, settling into his chair, waiting to see what would happen next.

Jaime gave him an exasperated look, as Jorah Mormont began to speak. “Mr Baelish, do you know a man by the name of Oswell Kettleblack?”  
Baelish frowned and looked thoughtful, then spoke. “He managed my farm—he went to an old-age home when I sold the farm. Why do you ask?”  
“He died yesterday. But before he died, he made a statement to the police.” And Jorah looked at Jaime, who pulled out several sheets of paper from a notebook he held in his hand. And then he spoke. “I was called in to take Mr Kettleblack’s statement; his old age home is close to my precinct. I couldn’t understand why he didn’t send for a priest or a minister, if he was a dying man; why a cop? But when he told me this, I understood.”

And Jaime read out the statement, in which Oswell Kettleblack described how one Petyr Baelish had offered him the job of farm manager and his wife the job of housekeeper, with an option to live in the Baelish farmhouse. If he and his wife wanted the job, they had to perform a simple task for him; help steal a baby girl out of her hospital crib in Boston and transport her to an orphanage in upstate New York. If they performed this job with no one being the wiser, they would be hired for good. Mr Baelish even offered to sell them and their sons the farm, if they wanted to buy it, in ten years or so. They thought it was an excellent idea. Oswell Kettleblack had been a farm labourer all his life; he’d somehow managed to make a living sufficient to maintain a family, but all three boys had to enlist in the army, since they wanted to get a college education. Mr and Mrs Kettleblack thought they could save their money and buy the farm in ten years or so. The boys would be back by then, and they could join them on the farm. So they did as Baelish asked and got the baby out of the hospital and into their car. They took the little baby to the orphanage and left her there on the doorstep, as they were told to do. Later, Mrs Kettleblack, who had a neat, flowing and ladylike hand, even wrote a few letters as dictated to her by Mr Baelish. Unknown to him, she kept copies of those letters. She’d worked as a cleaning lady in a hospital in Boston that was managed by nuns; she was able to steal the forms they made the husbands of expectant women fill out. These forms were filled out by Mr Kettleblack; the details were supplied by Mr Baelish. 

However, their plans did not work out; the boys never returned. Two of the three were killed—one in ‘Nam, the other in Cambodia. They had not heard of their third son—there were rumours that he had deserted or joined a narcotics gang. Mrs Kettleblack, who’d died a few years after Alayne left for college, swore that this was a judgement on them; she begged her husband to reveal the truth of their involvement in the kidnapping of the little baby to the police before he died. He promised his wife he would do so.

Tyrion watched Baelish’s face while Jaime read the statement. Mormont looked at Baelish stonily.

“Do you have anything to add, Mr Baelish?” Jaime asked, looking up from the papers in his hand.  
Baelish looked at him coldly. “I will not make any statements, sir, without the presence of my attorney.”

“This story that Kettleblack tells,” Jorah Mormont began conversationally, “has been confirmed by a laboratory in Boston. Ms Alayne Baelish was in Boston this weekend, with a friend, getting a paternity test done. She’d already had one done in New York; her friend had advised her to do so, if she wanted to learn anything about her mother. She took some nail parings of yours (Baelish looked startled) and had them sent to a laboratory, along with her own nail parings. She was told that you were not her father. And she took some clothes across to the orphanage where she grew up—she told you about it, right? (Another startled look) She got the letter and the papers filled out by the Kettleblacks—the originals, mind you. They match the copies Mrs Kettleblack made. As for the Boston paternity test—it proves she’s the missing Stark baby. What do you say to that, Mr Baelish?”

Baelish remained silent, as Jaime read out the warrant for his arrest and handcuffed him. As he was led out, he spoke to Lyn Corbray, requesting him to send for Evan Hunter, his lawyer. Tyrion got up to leave, exchanging a look of sheer relief with Jorah Mormont. He could finally tell Alayne the truth was out in the open. She need never call Baelish her father again.

**Author's Note:**

> I was relieved to learn that paternity testing was available in 1985, since I have set this story in the late '80s. I'm not so certain about the time taken to complete these tests; some sites say it takes one to four days. I don't know if this was the case in the '80s, but this is what I have chosen to assume. Please let me know if I am incorrect about this--I can always make a change.


End file.
